So worked on the neck tonight and got it finished enough for painting.

So cut the wastage off with the band saw, and using the scraper took the excess down to the neck blank sides. Then with the razor files started the shaping process.

Couple of hours later had the shape and size I was after. Sanded it down from 80 to 240 grit but I'll probably touch it again with some 400 or better before sealing.

Then it was finish off the end so that it extends into a thumb rest, drill the holes and thin the headstock down to 15mm ready for the tuners. David did that on the big belt sander. Too easy to get it wrong and have to start again. I'm getting better with that machine but it doesn't take too much to take too much wood off.

And all of a sudden it was 9pm. The time goes pretty fast some nights but I got a lot done tonight.

When did you see it Michael? Were you in the shop earlier today? I didn't get there till after 2pm, when they said the power would be off I spent the day umpiring some primary school softball. It was wet but lots of fun. Oh and yes it's a 30" scale.

Thanks for the nice comments guys and no I won't be building your necks, but feel free to borrow the design for the extension because I did! I've seen it on a couple of basses now and besides the obvious thumb rest I like the aesthetic. The guitar I built for Pete had a wave on the bottom of the fret board so this is really an extension of that and being so short in scale I had lots of timber hanging over. I could almost use a guitar sized fretboard on one of these, almost.

So having a couple of hours this afternoon I routed the binding channel on the rear and made the control cavity rout. It was a quiet shop with only three of us in this afternoon, well it was quiet till I got there...

So another 4 hours tonight in the shop. It's pretty cold out so only the 4 of us in for the evening. Workshop was about 13DegC so not bad. Because there wasn't a lot of people to keep an eye on, David was able to assist with the machining and we got a heap done. Rob's away on holiday so Dan is helping out while doing his own stuff too.

So tonight I cut the scarf joints and glued up two necks. The jig makes it so easy and they just slip together without needing any adjusting with a sanding block.

Ran the Walnut body through the thicknesser and drum sander, routed the chambers in the walnut body and sealed the larger chamber where the F hole will be. Sanded the router marks out of course. The pencil marks are where the template first sat and then I moved it back a bit, having had a look at where the holes would of have been. Did the same on the last one too so the template needs a notation for the next build.

Ran the Poplar top through the thicknesser and the drum sander, glued it to the walnut body ready for more work on Thursday night. The forearm cut on this one will be through the top as it's substantially thicker than the first in the series.

I also ordered the pickups today for the two current basses and the final one in the series. Fishman Matrix units were 8 weeks away so I've gone with LR Baggs units which are very similar and a bit cheaper too.

I think the last one will be a fretted unit and may have a single magnetic pick up as well as the piezo unit. Still pondering that though.

^ Let's not go there please. There is some logic behind removing weight the way I have but it's not engineered in any way for tonal changes.

Tonight went past really quickly, another quiet night in the shop which suits me just fine.

Took the single cut body out of the clamps, cleaned up the edges and finished rough sanding to shape and then put the F holes in both bodies. Contoured the edges of them so they have some softness and depth like they do on violins and then started the hole filling process on the poplar top. I'm using dust from the gidgee radius sanding mixed with Aryldite to fill up the holes. I expect they'll sink overnight and I'll be doing more tomorrow and maybe again on Monday night before scraping and sanding it all flat again. Looking at the walnut and poplar body I'm now not sure that I'll be binding it like I thought I would. The figure on the top might be enough without adding the bling that the pearloid binding I selected originally would add.